


Carry Them To The Sky

by WiEGoP



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Drama, Canon Rewrite, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death Fix, Epic Bromance, Everything is a Series of Unfortunate Events, F/M, Family Feels, Fatherhood, Friends to Lovers, Gen, Just the Worst Luck, Male-Female Friendship, No Beta We Die Like Titans, Operation to Retake Wall Maria, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Parent-Child Relationship, Poverty, Slow Burn, Teen Pregnancy, The Underground (Shingeki no Kyojin), Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-18 20:15:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29614836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WiEGoP/pseuds/WiEGoP
Summary: It's 844, and Levi is the strongest thug in The Underground, unaware of the powerful men scheming to use him. But, before nobles and military commanders can put their plan in action, disease festering in the slums threatens Levi's life, and removes him from their calculations.Haunted by childhood memories, the price of his survival has Levi desperately clawing a different path to bring his fragile family from the suffocating darkness and up to the light.Canon Divergent AU where Levi and friends aren't recruited for the 23rd Scouting Expedition.
Relationships: Levi Ackerman & Furlan Church, Levi Ackerman & Furlan Church & Isabel Magnolia, Levi Ackerman & Isabel Magnolia
Comments: 11
Kudos: 14





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> AN:  
> I'm going with Farlan instead of Furlan, since Farlan is the spelling for the actual Scottish name. 
> 
> I'm also mushing together Isabel's origins from both the Anime and Manga. 
> 
> Please comment and critique!

There were, even in the Underground, places to find luxuries. Bars with fine liquor, shops with quality tobacco, entertainment establishments where the company for sale was still clean. And in all of these places, if you knew how to ask and who to ask, an assortment of more illicit substances, and less legal entertainments. After all, the unregistered underclass beneath the capital was a large enough mass of human lives to grow an upper crust made up of cutthroat merchants, slumlords, and crime bosses, often all in the same person.

  
But more than that, in some of the the neighborhoods closest to the stairwells and closest to the light, were shops, bars, gaming houses, and brothels dedicated to serving those from above; adventurous young nobles hunting for a whiff of the immoral and their corrupt elders finding new avenues to profit and power in connections with organized crime. In these places alone Military Police regularly patrolled, protecting what they were paid to protect, reporting what they were paid to report, and closing their eyes and mouths at the drop of a coin.

  
In these neighborhoods, the cobbles of the streets were repaired, and kept clear of trash and beggars. Non descript carriages with the shades tightly drawn could be carried down by freight lift from above, taking their mysterious passengers to exclusive 'social clubs' where deals were made unfit for the light of day.

  
The finest, and most exclusive, of these establishments were located in the grand tower houses. These had long ago been built as private refuges for the rich, with tall towers that overlooked the rest of the glowing underground. But now, after eighty years of peace in the capital above, the tower houses were prized by the crime bosses not only for the view, but also for providing rooms high above the stench of the streets and open gutters below, and beyond the reach of any prying eyes or ears. One would need wings to spy in on the meetings held there.

  
Wings, or Omni-Directional-Mobility-Gear.

  
Crouched on the eaves at the top of the tower, clinging to the stone with clammy fingers, a cloaked figure leaned closer to the top of the window below, listening intently to men self assured they didn't need to keep their voices down. Most gang bosses preferred to direct the actions of their underlings from relative safety. Levi was not one of those gang leaders.

  
Really, he had never intended to become anyone's leader. For years after he'd been out on his own, Levi had avoided any permanent connections. He'd join different crews for single jobs, take his cut, and move on. And for a long time no one had pressed the issue, because while Levi was strong and quick and smart, he wasn't pleasant company. He was hired around like a mule, and after a successful heist whoever paid for him was more than happy to see the short, sour-faced man leave before his demeanor could ruin any celebrations.

  
But Underground, strength had it's own gravity, and the strong attracted orbiters whether they wanted them or not. Eventually, someone came along shrewd and determined enough to prod Levi from his solitude. Farlan Church, a young thug with education and manners a cut above most in the slums. Circumspect and cautious; with a plan for every problem, and a problem for every plan. A man who had, again and again, built gangs around his intelligence and charisma, only to have them implode when some cocky muscle drawn to the action got close enough to the leader to sniff out Farlan's weakness.

  
In Levi, Farlan had finally found someone tough who wasn't interesting in going for the throat the second he slipped up and showed his soft underbelly. In Farlan, Levi finally had someone whose company he could tolerate to act as a buffer between him and everyone else. With Levi as the figurehead of their gang, and Farlan as intermediary, no one thought to challenge either of them.  
Still, when Levi made his plans, even now, he put himself as the lead actor, with others in supporting roles. Because he was the strongest, because he could control the situation, because in almost all instances, Levi had the best chance of success.

  
Tonight though, Levi wondered if he should have Farlan take his position on the tower. He normally was nonplussed by heights, but he felt dizzy. He normally was tireless, but his climb up the tower, had left him winded. And worst of all, the damp cold air, and dust from the roof tiles, were settling into his throat, the throat that had been aching more and more over the last couple days. He could feel the tightness across his chest as he fought back the overwhelming urge to cough. The men inside the tower were drinking. Levi could hear the clink of glasses.

  
"When are they coming in?"

  
"Should be Friday."

  
"How much are you expecting?"

  
"So we've got a load of the decommissioned canisters marked for scrap. Dents and what not. Fifty of them. My contact in headquarters up there promised he'll fill 'em off before they're shipped out. The driver unloads em to my freight guy, and instead of the furnace we got em. No one cares too much about some old scrap canisters. The metal's valuable, yeah, but not enough that my contact can't make em disappear without questions. And then we got 100 kilos of gas. All we need to get the gas down here."

  
"Sure thing. 25% of the street value, in cash, will let you down the freight elevator on the 14th stairway. Cash in in advance."

  
"25%? Just to get through the stairs? Come on man. Work with me a little. This isn't a one time job here. We can get something real steady worked up."

  
"Yeah, and every guy I got working that staircase is gonna want his cut of the--"

  
A loud barking cough above them cut them off.

  
"What was that!?"

  
One man ran to the window and leaned out, trying to look up at the roof.

  
Damnit Levi grabbed his chest, trying to choke back the wheezing fit. He lay back, flat against the gables. He felt sweat trickling down his face, his eyes watering as the burning in his chest became unbearable. But he didn't dare take another breath. He tried to listen, over the pounding in his ears.

  
"What is it?"

  
"Shhhh."

  
"But who could even be up--"

  
"Just shut up."

  
Levi's oxygen-deprived body overrode his will, and he succumbed to a uncontrollable coughing fit.

  
"Is there a way up there!?" One of the men shouted.

  
Shit. Levi caught his breath just long enough to slide to the side of the roof opposite the window, and fire off his ODM gear. he hooked into one of the massive stone columns that supported the rock sky of The Underground, and leapt from the building, swinging at blinding speed over the flickering lights below. Praying that the men were still looking out the opposite direction.

  
Using ODM gear required strength, concentration, training, and instinct. The reels and the gas propelled a person toward the cable anchors, but it was up to the strength of the user to pull their limbs against the inertia of their forward momentum, hold themselves upright, and use every part of their body to steer themselves midair. And up to training to know just which of the switches and valves on the grips would shoot the anchors toward the desired target. And it was up to the instinct to decide at just what moment to release the anchors and grapple for a new tethering place.

  
To Levi, it was as natural as breathing. Unfortunately, he was finding breathing pretty difficult right now.

  
He opened his mouth to gasp for air, but the wind rushing in sent him into another coughing fit. He should have long ago grappled to another target, but his fingers fumbled on the triggers and the reel pulled him all the way to the pillar. Too fast. He slammed into the rock, barely getting his legs and arms up in time to cushion the collision. Were they looking after him? Levi gritted his teeth and looked over his shoulder, sending the world spinning around him. He was relieved to see that the anchors had hit the column in such a way that he was to mostly out of the line of sight from the tower.  
He looked down. The pillar abutted an alleyway. So he released tension on the reels and slowly lowered to the ground, keeping as close as possible to the rock face. When his feet hit the dirt, he released the anchors, and the reels sucked the cables back into his gear. He knelt on the damp ground taking fast shallow breaths for several minutes, until he heard footsteps behind him. A hand gripped his shoulder and pulled him into the alley.

  
"Levi!" Farlan Church whispered, leaning over him. Levi's partner was of medium height and medium build, blue-eyed and ash blonde. Neighborhood girls considered him cute, if not handsome. They'd learned to ignore Levi.

  
He grabbed both of Levi's arms visually checking him over. "What happened? I saw you whack that column. Did you hit your head?"

  
The shorter man pushed him away. "I'm fine." He barked, then doubled over, chest heaving as he tried to hack the burning tickle in his lungs out past his aching throat.

  
"I thought you said you were over your cold?"

  
"I--cough--I was over this damned--coughcough"

  
Farlan pressed his hand to Levi's forehead. "You should have let me--"

  
Levi slapped the hand away. "Get off that. I'm--"

  
"You've got a fever."

  
"No. It just was hot waiting up there." Levi straightened up his cloak, carefully arranging it to disguise as much of their illicit gear as possible. He peeked out of the alley, checking for trouble, then strolled out as nonchalant as possible.

  
Farlan followed a few steps behind, and remained behind him the entire long walk back to their place through the winding warren of narrow alleys lined with filthy brick and broken plaster. His brows were furrowed in concern. Every few minutes Levi would overtaken by more hoarse coughing, and because Levi was in the lead, he didn't seem to realize how uncharacteristically slow he was walking.  
The concern only deepened when they finally reached their apartment. Levi slipped on one of the steps leading up the door, and barely caught himself. At the top of the stairs, the door swung open, bathing the entryway with lamp light.

  
"Bro! Farlan!" A green-eyed girl stood by the door, a mixing bowl on one narrow hip, a batter dipped spoon in the other hand.

  
"Don't tell me you're trying to cook again." Levi rasped, as he pushed past her into the front room. The apartment was small, and every item inside, from the dishes to the furniture was battered and timeworn, but freshly scrubbed. The secondhand refuse of the world above, scraped clean. It was all tidy, except for the hearth in the back.

  
"What happened?" She asked, as Farlan shut the door behind them. "I expected you guys back hours ago."

  
"They were late." Levi frowned as he surveyed the chaos in the kitchen. Charcoal was mounded haphazardly in the firebox, smoldering unevenly. The entire counter was dusted with flour and salt, drips of dough and greasy tallow. Canisters and jars had been pulled down and left open. A few lumpy pancakes, charred on the edges, and pasty white in the center, were stacked on a plate beside the hearth top.

  
Her sad attempts at cooking, and a tarnished metal ring worn on a cord as a necklace, were the only hints of femininity Isabel Magnolia displayed. The scruffy young red-head was rough around every edge, with a wild exuberance that bordered on the feral. She cussed, and drank, and would have smoked if Levi allowed it. Ever since they'd known her, she'd worn trousers and boy's shirts, which only made her look smaller and skinnier. How old was she? Farlan didn't know and hadn't asked. It was hard to say how much the slightness of her body was due to age, nature, or deprivation. They'd seen her around the neighborhood for years, just another dirty face in the herd of brats that ran the streets, constantly culled by accidents, malnutrition, and disease; with nominal parents, nominal homes, rudimentary education, and no papers. Unregistered. Invisible to the government above.

  
Little more than a year ago she'd crashed through their door, clutching a bird, pursued by thugs and begging to stay. And Levi had agreed, so long as she was willing to clean, run errands, and follow directions. She'd quickly caught on to vertical maneuvering, making her invaluable to the gang, but Levi couldn't have known that potential ahead of time. If it had been early on in their partnership, Farlan may have been surprised he'd let her stay that first night. But Farlan was a man who made his living on his sense of perception. By the time Isabel burst her way into their lives, he'd observed Levi covertly rescuing his share of 'birds'. It was a weakness they shared.

  
If only they could convince her to stop experimenting in the kitchen.

  
Farlan pulled the bowl out of her hand and sniffed at the contents. "Did you try to make these with powdered milk?"

  
Isabel jutted her lower lip out, and mumbled. "It was all we had you know."

  
Farlan briefly considered tasting of the batter, but thought better of it. He was about to scold Isabel for, once again, wasting valuable food, but was interrupted by Levi coughing, this time so forcefully that he had to lean against a battered chair to steady himself.

  
"Levi." Farlan moved closer, to get a better look at his friend in the lamplight. Levi sank into the chair burying his face into his sleeve, each exhausting breath expelled more hoarse and raw than the one before. When he finally lowered his arm, and glanced up, his eyes were bloodshot and listless. His lips pale, and ashen.

  
Isabel's green eyes were wide. "Bro, you sound awful!"

  
Levi glared at Isabel. "Stay there." he croaked out. She stood stunned, her wooden spoon dripping unappetizing batter onto the floor. "And you--" He started to say to Farlan, but too late. Farlan once again had shoved his hand beneath Levi's sweat dampened bangs and onto his clammy forehead. After a moment his frown deepened.

  
"You have a fever."

  
"Stop fussing over me like an old hen, you idiot." Levi pushed him away. "I already knew I had a cold. Now back off before you catch it too." He cleared the phlegm out of his tender throat, and took several shallow breaths, hoping to stave off another fit.

  
"This isn't a cold." Farlan insisted. "Maybe it was at first but--"

  
Levi stood up, and took several unsteady steps to the stairs that led to their bedrooms. "Doesn't matter. Whatever it is. We're not spending any damn money on those damned doctors." His words were coming out in short gasps. He was trying everything to keep the irritation in his chest to a minimum. "All I need is a hot pot of tea, some peace and quiet, and this brat to clean up after her horrible experiment." He staggered his way up the stairs.

  
Farlan looked away from the exiting Levi, expecting to see Isabel either pouting or preparing a protest. Instead the girl was chewing her lip nervously. She grabbed a rag and began trying to mop up the counter. "You, you ever seen him like this?"

  
He shook his head and walked to the shelves by the hearth, pulling down and peering through the canisters, trying to find where Levi had hid his good tea. "He hardly ever gets sick, and is always just unbearable when he does. But--" From upstairs, they could hear the distressing hoarse barking of Levi's cough.

  
Farlan finally found the tin of tea stashed behind a sack of wrinkled onions. He popped the lid off the canister and took a long whiff of the fragrant dried leaves. Isabel smiled. "That'll make him feel better."

  
"At the very least it might take the edge off his attitude." Farlan said.

  
By the time the tea was done and carried it to the bedroom, Isabel had managed to scrape most of the charred pancake batter off the hearth's firebrick. Her eyes darted up to Farlan as he reentered the kitchen still carrying the full pot.

  
After pouring the tea into a jar and sealing it, he dumped the tea leaves out of the strainer and carefully spread them out on a clean cloth to dry. Pure black tea was expensive, but Levi couldn't stand the cheaper stuff, cut with hawthorn and elder and dyed black with printers ink. So they bought the pricey brands the nobles preferred, dried it after each brew, and rebrewed it until the leaves themselves were boiled away.

  
"He was already asleep." Farlan said, softly. "In the bed."

  
Isabel stopped scrubbing the counter and turned to him in shock. "In bed?"

  
Farlan nodded.

  
Isabel wrung her hands nervously. They both knew he usually slept sitting in a chair, his feet up on a stool, facing the door. If he had actually taken the bed..."We--We've got money, right?" She asked. "For a doctor? If he gets worse? Right?"

  
Farlan nodded again, "Yeah. We've got enough. Just enough." He threw a cushion onto their sofa, and flopped back, settling in for an anxious night's sleep. "But I doubt we'll get him to agree to spend it."

  
The next morning the apartment awoke to coughing, but Levi didn't emerge from his room. Farlan stuck his head in, bringing breakfast and last night's reheated tea, only to have Levi growl at him for it. Throughout the day they left various offerings at the doorway of tea and clean blankets, hot water, cold water, brandy, soup, and medicine. They disappeared inside, but Levi spent the rest of that day secluded, while Farlan and Isabel stewed in their mutual worry.

  
By the evening the hoarse cough had been muffled with a mucous rattle, and by the next morning Levi could barely croak out a protest as Farlan pulled him out of the bed and into a nearby chair so Isabel could change his sweat soaked sheets. Farlan laid a cold cloth on Levi's forehead, and Levi shoved his hand away to feebly hold the rag himself.

  
"If you're going to invade my room, at least stop touching me." Levi mumbled, his voice raspy.

  
"It's my room too." Farlan glanced at the bowls of uneaten soup from yesterday.

  
"Well, stay out anyway. Or you'll catch this shit, and Isabel will finish us off with her cooking." Levi wrapped his arm around his mouth and hacked into the sleeve of his shirt.

  
Isabel stood frozen, a threadbare sheet half unfolded in her hands. "Bro, you need a doctor."

  
"I don't need... a damn doctor." He gasped out.

  
Farlan crossed his arms over his chest. "This isn't a debate."

  
He pulled the rag off his forehead. "We don't have the... damn money to waste on the... shitty crooks down here that... call themselves doctors." Sweat glistened in the wrinkles of Levi's frown. Farlan could tell he was suppressing another fit.

  
"This isn't a debate." Farlan repeated. Levi opened his mouth to reply, but just as quickly he covered it, and all that came out was more distressingly wet coughing.

  
Like everything available in The Underground, doctors came in two varieties: expensive or dangerous. Farlan had shelled out money for gang members to be treated in the past, and knew which could be trusted.

  
Dr. Sauer was one; skilled, University trained, and passionate about the future of his craft. But his passion had got him into trouble when a nobleman's wife died after one of his cutting edge therapies. No longer trusted by the elite, he now he used the sick of The Underground as a testing field to refine his methods. Despite a reckless reputation, he was sought after by anyone with the cash, as he still could access medical supplies from above. But he wasn't cheap.

  
Farlan went out and got him anyway, earning an absolutely withering glare from Levi sitting up limply in the bed. But the house call was already paid for. The plump, middle aged man came wearing linen tied over his face as a mask. He slipped the glass tube of his thermometer under Levi's armpit, pressed the horn of his stethoscope to Levi's chest, one side, then the other and listened, opened his mouth and peered with a lantern down his throat, felt the glands under his neck, and took his pulse. As the examination proceeded the doctor's eyes narrowed thinner and thinner, until they formed a grim line. Finally, after several minutes, he pulled the thermometer away and held it to the lantern light, then sighed.

  
"You never had croup as a child, did you?" Levi shook his head. "How about you two?" he asked the witnesses in the doorway. They both nodded. "Good." The doctor carefully placed his fragile thermometer back in it's case. "We've been dealing with a particularly bad outbreak this year. Even above ground, I hear. And down here, where the air is bad, the children are practically dropping gasping in the gutters." He shook his head at Levi, "Given the state of your throat, It's a miracle you're still breathing unaided. And, I didn't like the rales I heard your lungs at all. I believe it has progressed to pneumonia."

  
He pulled a small vial out of his chest pocket and from within his bag he retrieved a case with a syringe, and another cardboard box. He set all three on the side table, and then turned to Farlan. "So, my diagnosis is severe croup with secondary infectious pneumonia. The best treatment plan available is intravenous serum to clear his blood of the croup toxins, and a series of rubiazol injections for the infection."

  
"How much?" Farlan asked.

  
Dr. Sauer gave a sum. The color drained from Isabel's face

  
"Get the hell out." Levi spat, "I'm not that sick."

  
Farlan ignored him. "We don't have all that right now. But you know we're good for it in the long run."

  
"Mr. Church, you know my practice. If people could pay me in promises down here, I'd bankrupt myself to exhaustion. If your friend doesn't recover you'll lose your will, maybe your ability, to repay your debt. And I'll have forfeited some very expensive medicines."

  
"Well, we can't pay you with money we don't have."

  
"Forget it, Farlan." Levi rasped, glaring at the doctor with bloodshot eyes. "We don't need his quack shit snake oil."

  
"Yeah, old man." Isabel butted in, "What's in those stupid jars anyway to make 'em so damn much?"

  
Dr. Sauer was used to being railed at for his prices so was non-plussed at the insults. Instead he relished an opportunity to explain his pharmacopeia. "The serum is derived from the blood plasma of horses that have been infected with croup animalcule. Without it, the toxins building up in your friend will begin to poison and inflame his heart and nerves."

  
"And these," He opened the cardboard box to reveal, nestled in tissue paper, small glass ampules filled with a dark red liquid. "These are a relatively new breakthrough. Some country doctor from the south discovered a few years ago that a pigment used to dye leather, when purified, actually cleared infectious agents from the body." He closed the box. "These are still rare, I can only get them in small quantities from the contacts I have at the University. I am charging you hardly more than they cost me. I only brought them because I thought, from prior experience, that you may have been able to afford them."

  
"Well we can't." Farlan said, bitterly. "Not unless you're willing to wait."

  
"Whadda bout part of the medicine?" Isabel asked. "Which one's cheaper?"

  
"We're not getting any of it." Levi muttered from his sickbed.

  
Running the vial of serum between his palms, Dr. Sauer considered his patient. "You're a strong man, Levi. Or you'd be dead already. Maybe, given enough time and rest, your body can beat back against whatever has settled into your lungs. But your heart can't fight forever against the poison those grey patches in your throat are leaching into your blood." He held up the vial of anti-toxin and named a price.

  
Farlan agreed, silencing Levi with a single meaningful glare. He put their rent money for that month in the doctor's outstretched hand, and the old man opened the case with the syringe.

  
X X X

  
For the next few days, Farlan and Isabel held their breath and watched. When Levi coughed out the remainder of the croup, and the stinking film didn't grow back, they dared to hope that the worst was over. But Levi stayed ashen grey and listless, unable to take a full breath without irritation or pain. He sulked in the bedroom with the door firmly shut, only staggering out to make brief demands in a voice that rattled deep in his chest. To Farlan it seemed like he was trying to hide from the concern of his housemates. And as the days passed, Levi struggled out of bed less and less.

  
On the day of the gas shipment Farlan had one of their gang scope out the 14th stairway to confirm that the deal had gone through. Detle came back with specifics and descriptions, and Farlan started scheming. He needed to pull a job. There was almost no cash in the house, and they were low on everything from food to soap. By the first of the month their landlord would come pestering for the rent. He was already snooping around, and he wasn't the only one.

  
In The Underground where strength had it's own gravity the a loss of a strong man would reshuffle the system. So rumors of Levi's ailing spread fast and mutated. The other members of their crew, other gang bosses operating on the turf, even the neighbors who relied on Levi's fussy and antisocial nature to keep their corner of the slum peaceful, they all had a bit to lose, or gain, if Levi went down. Farlan even heard from nervous friends who described cloaked men no one knew asking after Levi's health. With a smile, Farlan spun reassuring lies to anyone who asked, while inside his mind was sifting through everything with growing panic.

  
Isabel couldn't hide a single thought. She fussed relentlessly, doing laundry, wasting food cooking, and cleaning the apartment without being asked. Searching for any way to help, no matter how small, to stave off anxiety.

  
One evening, a week after the doctor's visit, her panic came to a terrifying head. Farlan had been staking out the 13th stairs, trying to piece together plans for a smash and grab with only two ODM gear users that would net them enough for rent, medicine, bribes, and food, in that order. When he got back, she met him at the door wearing her fear on her dampened sleeve and all over her face.

  
"I went in to check on Bro, and he didn't yell at me." She stammered out, huge green eyes leaking a steady stream of tears. "Cause he didn' know who I was. He was shaking like he was cold, an' I tried to touch him, an' he let me." She sniffed up a runny nose, "An he let me, Farlan. And Farlan, he was burning up. And then he coughed, and it was just horrible. He coughed forever, like he didn't even know what he was doing and then..." She held up a rag, tinged with rusty colored specks.

  
"What's he doing now?"

  
"Sleeping, I think. He keeps coughing in his sleep."

  
Farlan went upstairs to the bedroom, with Isabel following close behind. When he opened the door he was assailed by the warmth, the smell, hanging in the air. Levi was curled up on the bed half on his side, a handkerchief held limply to his mouth, shaking miserably. The blankets had been shoved off the bed onto the floor, and a single sheet was tangled around his legs. They'd been changing the bedding daily, but Levi was soaked.

  
"Go get some water." Farlan asked Isabel, and she scurried off.

  
"Levi?" Farlan walked around to the other side of the bed, and leaned over to grip his friend's shoulder. "Levi?"

  
He coughed weakly into the rag, eyes glazed and unfocused, "Kenny?"

  
Farlan winced. "Hey, Levi, lets get you cleaned up, right?"

  
"Shit, you're not Kenny." Levi wheezed , as Farlan helped him sit up, slid his arm under the sick man's shoulders and carefully guided him over to the chair. "He never... nagged me..."

  
"You eat anything today?" Farlan pulled the damp shirt off Levi and then bent down to help him out of his pants. The smaller man was shivering, but his skin was hot and sticky.

  
"Eat?" Levi murmured, "All this trash... tastes like shit."

  
Isabel came barging in just at the wrong moment of Farlan helping Levi change. Blushing furiously, she left the bucket and rushed back downstairs to grab laundry off a line strung up in the kitchen. They were washing something every day now. Her heart was pounding in her chest, not just from embarrassment. Seeing Levi that vulnerable and exposed, that weak. She bit her lip and tears welled up in her eyes again.

  
By the time she went back upstairs, Farlan had gotten Levi washed, dressed, and back in bed, and was now standing outside his door. When he saw her he forced a thin smile and put a hand on her shoulder.

  
"He, he isn't getting any better." Isabel stammered. "He needs that medicine the doc had."

  
"Tomorrow." Farlan said. "We're doing a job tomorrow, remember. Then we'll get the doctor again."

  
Her eyes were green pools of fear. "We can't leave 'em alone."

  
Farlan frowned, considering. "You're right. You'll stay here with Levi."

  
"But then, it'll be only you with gear, and..."

  
"Isabel, we need to do this job." For a moment, he let her see his own concern, "We need to do this job now." Her mouth opened, but no words came out. She nodded and he couldn't tell if realizing that he was worried had comforted her, or made it worse.

  
So, the next day Farlan checked his gear from top to bottom, loaded and holstered the single precious pistol they owned, and filled his tanks with the very last of their ODM gas. He'd picked Detle to run interference, Jan and Kurt for lookouts, and Elias to serve as backup in case things went the wrong way. Of the four, only Elias, a grim hunk of calculating muscle, demanded a full cut of the job. Kurt was new to the crew, young and eager to please his bosses. Small, speedy Detle and the always stolid Jan were holdovers from Farlan's old gang, and owed Farlan countless favors.

  
Poor Jan had lit up when asked. His crippled leg had him on crutches half the time, his weak knee always splinted and wrapped. Despite Farlan's attempt to let him go in the past, Jan had done his best to keep himself on the fringes of the group by serving as a lookout or spy. And there was no denying he was good at it. He could sit on a street corner for hours without anyone giving him a second glance, as long as he put an empty begging bowl at his feet.

  
Farlan met all four of them at the apartment stairs and hurried them out. The longer they lingered, the more Levi's absence would make itself felt. He glanced over his shoulder, Isabel was siting on the sofa, folding freshly washed sheets. She met his gaze wide-eyed, chewing her bottom lip anxiously. He gave her a hopeful smile, and shut the door behind him.

  
XXX

  
When the door opened again, Farlan was slung over Elias' shoulder, battered, muddy and bloodstained. Isabel rushed down the stairs from the bedrooms, and gaped at the browbeaten men entering the flat. Elias with Farlan, followed closely by Kurt and Detle.

  
"What the Hell happened?" She ran to Elias' side and grabbed Farlan's dangling arm. The blond man was awake, and looked mournfully at her, dripping blood from his soaked hair.

  
"They had lookouts." Kurt said as he leaned on the door jamb, wiping dirt from his boots with the hem of his cloak. "Hidden. Sharpshooter with a rifle fired after him, dinged his gear while he was escaping." The young man winced, "Anchor line got stuck and he fell out of the sky."

  
"Lucky for him, a roof met him halfway." Detle added.

  
Farlan moaned as he Elias threw him face first on the couch. "You think you're tough shit." the big man grumbled. "You're no Levi." Then he turned and left the apartment without another look.

  
In order to unlatch his ODM gear from the harness, Detle rolled Farlan to his side, earning him a strangled shout. Isabel was by his head running her fingers through his red stained hair, trying to find the source of the bleeding.

  
"Where does it hurt?" She asked.

  
"Gimmie a piece of paper." Farlan groaned. Isabel paused. "I'll make you a list." He hissed in pain as Detle unlaced and pulled off his boots.

  
The girl finally found the gash several inches above Farlan's ear. It was hardly longer than her thumb, but in the manner of scalp wounds, was absolutely pissing blood. She grabbed a mostly clean towel off a nearby table and pressed hard against the cut.

  
Farlan was breathing quick and shallow, and gave a clipped cry as Detle started unbelting the harness for his gear. Isabel glanced to where Kurt still stood by the door. "Do we need to get a Doctor?"

  
Farlan made a noise between a sob and a laugh. "No money for it."

  
Isabel froze. "No money?" she whispered.

  
Farlan caught her gaze and held it, blood leaking from his hair down the side of his face. "Sorry. It was supposed to be an easy job."

  
The door handle jiggled and everyone momentarily panicked. When it opened, Jan came limping in with his cane. "We weren't followed."

  
Kurt relaxed, and as Jan moved over to the couch, the young gang member slunk out of the apartment, not wanting to hang around the hideout too long after a botched job in case Jan was wrong. No one paid him any attention. Isabel had Detle take over pressing on the towel as she went for some bandages.

  
Jan was methodically running his hands over Farlan's legs, then arms, gripping, prodding, trying to take each limb through a gentle range of motion. When he got to the left ankle and rolled the foot in his hand, Farlan bit his fist and shuddered. Then Jan pulled his shirt open, displaying a tapestry of fresh colorful bruises, especially along the sides of his chest, where the straps from the harness looped around his arms. Jan carefully ran his hands along the length of every rib.

  
"Where did you learn to do that?" Isabel asked as she tightly wrapped Farlan's head in bandages.

  
"Been to a lot of doctors over the last few years complaining of bone aches. Every one of them takes you through the same routine." He ran a finger over a purply-red bruise, and heard a sharp intake of breath, he pressed gently at the spot.

  
"Hell, Jan." Farlan gasped. "Is that your finger or a fucking knife?" Jan continued his investigation, and found two other hidden agony triggers.

  
Detle and Isabel looked at Jan expectantly. Finally he smiled slightly. "I don't think he's broken a leg or arm. Might be something broken in his foot, or it might be a sprain. But he's got at least three cracked ribs, if not more."

  
"But he doesn't need a doctor?" Isabel asked.

  
"He'll survive."

  
"Sorry guys." Farlan said, weakly. One hand was over his face. "Thanks for getting me out of there. Next job we do, I swear, I'll pay you back for this one."

  
Detle shrugged. "We can't really get anything good going till you and Levi are game anyway."

  
"Even after this, I'm pretty sure I still owe you." Jan added. "Just... rest up."

  
Both men left. Isabel and Farlan sat in the dim lantern light, the barrenness of the tiny apartment encircling them. From upstairs, muffled, they heard a terrible coughing. Terrible not because it was loud, or violent. Terrible because it was weak and exhausted.

  
"Tomorrow." Farlan said, finally. His voice was quiet because of his shallow breathing. "Tomorrow, Isabel, I want you to take the pistol, and Levi's watch, and my watch, and my books..."

  
"Your books!?"

  
"Yeah, and clean up the boots we got this year and take them too. We still have old ones. And," Farlan's voice briefly caught in his throat, "And take that box down from the top shelf. You know the red lacquered one?" Isabel nodded. "Get it."

  
Isabel pushed a stool over to the tall shelf in the room that held all of Farlan's precious books. She stood on her tiptoes on the stool and pulled down the little wooden box painted in red lacquer. Farlan looked so sad and so resigned when she handed it to him and he lifted the lid. It was stuffed with letters, faded from rereading and refolding, and a few small, simply done pencil portraits. He shuffled these to the side and pulled out a tiny velvet bag, then closed the box.

  
"This too" Farlan said, handing the bag to her. She peeked inside, within were a few simple rings, one gold, one silver, one embedded with tiny red stone, a pair of hoop earrings that might have been gold, a necklace of small, blue, semiprecious stones, a keepsake pendant with curls of hair behind glass.

  
"Where am I taking all of this?" Isabel asked. In her heart, she already knew.

  
"Pawn shop."

  
Isabel squeezed her eyes shut, and nodded.

  
"You don't have anything worth pawning, I know." Farlan said. "That's okay, just...just try to get whatever you can. As much as you can for the stuff. And we'll pray it's enough."


	2. Chapter 2

"I'm telling you, you stupid old geezer, this is silver!"

"And I'm saying, you gutter swilling alley brat, that it's nothing but pewter, and I've had enough of your dickering around. Next word out of your rotten little mouth, I won't give you a cent for it." The surly pawnbroker leaned on his counter, his tiny shop glittering with pendants, watches, rings and snuff boxes. 

In Isabel's outstretched palm was the ring from her necklace. 

This was the last pawn shop Farlan had told her to go to, a semi-respectable hole in the wall on the border of The Underground's party district. A business frequented by the higher class ladies of the evening, who would hock their costume jewelry at the beginning of the week for bread money, and buy it back for the weekend's peak traffic. 

Farlan had sent her out with a written list and verbal instructions. Where to try to sell what, how much to start at asking, how much to settle for. What she could offer to sell outright for a higher payout, and what they might hope to reclaim later if they could. She'd tossed the useless list as soon as she was out the door and, as always, relied on her memory. 

The boots were gone, as were more than half the books and Farlan's watch. The pistol would be held for two months, Levi's watch for three, but the interest was steep. A few of Farlan's books they could buy back up to six months out. The bookseller had been grateful to get some inventory, and so had been generous with the terms of the loan. 

The only piece of jewelry Farlan had forbidden Isabel from selling directly was the keepsake pendant. The frame and chain were gold, so he couldn't afford to hold it back from pawn, but he couldn't bear to let it go completely, not yet. 

There wasn't a single thing left in the apartment worth more than a loaf of white bread except for their ODM equipment. Putting them in hawk would be eating the horse that pulls the cart, moreover the gear was illegal and potentially traceable. But everything else they had was turned to loans.

And it just barely covered the rent. 

Isabel glared at the older man, who was impassive as a plank. Pawnbrokers were immune to resentment. She slapped the ring on his counter, and he handed her the cash. Biting back tears, trying to keep a straight face, she she tramped out the door, then looked down at the money in her fist. It wasn't enough. It wasn't nearly enough. She shoved the money down the front of her shirt, into a pocket sewn inside, safe and close to her skin. Then she sat down on the curb, with her tattered old boots in the mud, and tried not to cry.

How long had it been since she'd tried to steal anything on her own? She'd never been the best pickpocket, but she'd pulled it off a couple times back in the day. Maybe if she snuck out with the gear? Something to give her a clean getaway if she was sussed out. She rested her arm on her knee, and her head on her arm, and felt her momentary flash of inspiration drain away. They were out of maneuvering gas. A few mournful tears leaked out of her wide green eyes and slid all the way down to her chin. She sniffled, her stuffy nose barely detecting the musty, wet omnipresent stink of her subterranean home. 

"Hey there honey," She looked up, into the grinning face of a man she didn't recognize. "You looking for work?"

X X X

It was getting late. Not that daylight and nighttime had much meaning beneath the ground. Still, Isabel had been gone all day, and Farlan was starting to ponder which of his trusted guys lived close enough to stagger over to, so he could send them out after her. Farlan winced as he limped his way down the stairs. His head was aching and swimming, and he guessed he could add a concussion to his list of injuries.

Levi had mercifully recognized his friend on first sight this time, and had managed to choke down half a bowl of porridge, and drink some lukewarm tea. But then had slipped into a dazed sleep before Farlan could finish changing the damp sheets. His cough rattled in his chest, and his fingertips were faintly blue. 

Farlan slumped on the couch, wracking his aching brain for some kind of plan. If Isabel came back with enough for the medicine, he could try fobbing off on the rent. Their building's landlord had a hardnosed reputation, but that was only because he was a middleman for the crooked boss who claimed the neighborhood, and the boss only had that on the sufferance of whatever noble he'd bribed. He'd promise the landlord interest, a bribe, a favor. They'd been consistent in paying up to this point. They kept the building quiet, and didn't let their business follow them home. 

It probably wouldn't work. 

He could go around and coax for loans from the rest of the gang. Ask them all to chip in. They might give him the money. But he'd lose most of them in the long run. Farlan would be doing what had lost him his position time and time again by rolling over and showing his belly; begging and showing weakness to the kind of people who only trusted power. All in the name of saving a friend.

Farlan was still brooding over the situation when Isabel came bounding in. He didn't even have time to grill her on where she'd been, because following close on her heels was Dr. Sauer with his bag. 

"Hey! Farlan! I brought the Doc!" Her green eyes glittered with pride and excitement. "We got everything all paid for."

"The patient is still abed upstairs, I take it?" 

Farlan nodded mutely. A dozen questions were on the tip of his tongue, but he wasn't going to ask them until he and Isabel were alone. 

"If you would come up to observe. The young lady and I have agreed, if you're so disposed that is, that I furnish you a syringe to administer the subsequent injections yourselves. It will save you the expense of a series of housecalls, and myself the bother."

Farlan struggled up from the couch with a pained groan, and Dr Sauer looked him up and down, as if noticing the bandages and bruises for the first time. "You seem to be in a sorry state yourself. Do you require an exam?"

"No." He took a few shallow breaths until the stabbing from his ribs subsided, then limped up the stairs after Isabel and the doctor.

Levi was roused and then propped back on every pillow in the house. His awareness seemed to ebb and flow as Dr. Sauer examined him again, listening for a long time to his lungs. The patient didn't say a word, just glared up at the doctor, or Farlan, in the moments he seemed to recognize them. 

The doctor put away his stethoscope and thermometer. "If this were any other man, Mr. Church, I would say it was quite hopeless at this point. But his pulse is strong, and I'm not detecting sepsis." The doctor looked to Farlan, questioning.

"If it's already paid for, then do it." the younger man said without hesitation.

The doctor pulled the cardboard box of ampoules out of his bag, then a syringe, then an ampoule cutter. "He will need an injection here, in the muscle of his forearm, every other day. As I said in my last visit, the medicine is derived from a dye. There may be a lasting red mark at the injection site."

"Fine." Farlan leaned over to watch the doctor work.

After Farlan had his instructions and Dr. Sauer had left, he finally turned to Isabel. She had watched everything with rapt attention, her early triumphant exhuberance dampened by the doctor's ominous words. Now she seemed tentatively hopeful.

"Where did you get the money?"

"I did everything you told me to."

"And?"

Isabel gave him a grin that didn't quite reach her eyes. "And then when I was at the pawn shop, someone asked me if I was looking to do a job. It paid great! Easiest job I've ever pulled by myself." She reached into her shirt, and pulled out a small wad of additional cash. "See, the doc didn't even take all of it! It's not quite enough for the rent in total, but it should be enough to keep him off our back till we get all of it." She slapped the bills into Farlan's hand.

He looked down at the money, trying to do the math in his head, trying to subtract what he'd figured their possessions were worth from how much the doctor must have cost, but only coming up with a headache. Before he could ask Isabel any follow-up questions she'd retreated to her room. 

If he hoped to get more answers from her later, he was out of luck. By the next morning Farlan could barely struggle off the couch. Every inch of his body fought him in a bruised revolt for the fall two days ago. His head was pounding and Isabel swore he had a low fever. For a few days the house was a sorry state. Two bedridden men, with a anxious girl fluttering over both of them noisly tearing the house apart and even more agressively putting it back together. Threatening them both with the grim specter of her cooking. When she wasn't doing laundry, dishes, cleaning, cutting bandages, boiling water or rearranging everything she could get her hands on, she was collapsed on her bed. 

Once a day Farlan would drag himself up the stairs to tend to Levi. The day after the second injection, Levi's fever finally broke. His cough went from bubbling and soggy, to dry and irritated. He recognized his friends, and insulted them. He sat up on his own. He took care of his business without help. He ate and drank what he was given and he complained loudly about the taste. When he called Isabel a stupid brat while munching a slice of burnt toast, it was almost enough to make her cry in relief. 

"I told you to stop." Levi said from his chair, when Farlan limped into the room with clean clothes and bedding. "I can do it myself. You look like twice the hell I do. You get trampled by a mule?"  
Farlan smiled. He pulled out the syringe and opened the cardboard box of ampoules. Three injections left. He carefully used the cutter to score around the neck, and then broke off the top of the tiny glass bottle.

"Who taught you do to all this shit?" Levi was watching. 

"Dr. Sauer. Guess you don't remember." He drew the medicine into the syringe and then gripped Levi's left arm, lining the shot up along the three other red blotches from his previous injections. 

"Where did you even get the money for all that?"

"Pawned and sold. We'll have to do a job soon if you want your watch back. Isabel did some work on her own."

"Isabel?"

"Yup!" Isabel was standing in the doorway of the bedroom. Her mouth was, again, widened in a huge grin but there was a wistful glint in her eyes. "Looks like you're feeling better, Bro!"

Levi's steely eyes narrowed. "What kind of work?" 

But Isabel was already gone down the hall, "I'm making you tea!" She shouted back.

Levi gritted his teeth, "If she manages to burn tea..."

Farlan packed the syringe away. "The girl could burn ice."

It was a few days later that Isabel slipped out of the apartment. Neither Farlan nor Levi noticed she was gone until mid evening, assuming she was spending a day sleeping in. Not that unusual for her, most Underground inhabitants had broken internal clocks. But when she didn't emerge for Farlan's cooking, they'd dared to open the door to the girl's room, only to find a nearly illegible note on her side table. ' _Gon fmons bak latr dut wory._ '

Levi squinted at the paper. "Nice to know all those hours you spent trying to teach her are finally useful."

"She didn't get a single word right." Farlan sighed.

"What the hell is fmons?"

"A friend? Friends in general?"

"Mom's?" Levi coughed, his throat and chest still itching, "She still had family down here."

"Well, I hope it's not any of the 'friends' who jumped her that..."

"It's not." Levi's hoarse voice was flat and grim. 

Farlan put the note back on the table. "Well, she's a big girl. She knows how to take care of herself." It was more a question than a statement. 

Levi snorted. "I'm not her nanny, she can stay out wherever she wants."

So, officially, neither man waited up for her. Farlan had retaken the bed. Levi leaned back in his chair. They spent hours pretending to sleep in a house with a missing piece, silence only punctuated by occasional coughing, until they both finally dozed off. 

Of the two, Levi was the lighter sleeper. So when sounds of rustling seeped from downstairs, he woke up. Slow footsteps on the creaking floorboards. The sound of the hand pump at the sink, over and over. Heavy footsteps up the stairs. When he heard Isabel's door open and shut, he closed his eyes again and began to drift off. Then Isabel's door opened again, footsteps back on the stairs, the sound of the hand pump. When he heard the first stair creak, Levi got up from his chair. By the time he opened the door, Isabel was in the narrow hall, holding a full bucket of water, swallowed by a loose nightdress she almost never wore. 

"Bro!" She whispered. Her hair was damp, her bare arms and face freshly scrubbed. 

"What time is it?" He asked, low voice scratchy.

"I--I don't know." Isabel stammered, eyes downcast, she switched the bucket behind her back. "Morning sometime."

Levi crossed his arms. "You were out late."

She shifted from one foot to another. "Yeah, you get my note?" 

"Could barely read it."

She turned around and grabbed the doorknob to her room, opening it and sliding the bucket inside. Levi was about to return to his own room, when he heard Isabel behind him. 

"Bro," He looked up, and she was in her doorway, arms still pulled behind her back. Her chin was down, but he could see her eyes were bloodshot. Levi wondered if she'd been drinking. She searched his face. "You--you're really feeling better. Aren't you?"

"Of course." Levi scoffed. 

With slightly trembling hands that didn't feel like her own, Isabel shut the door to her room. In the dim candlelight, she dropped a washcloth into the fresh bucket, and pulled the nightdress off her back. Crouching over the bucket, she ran a sliver of soap over the small half moon bruises on her arms, then grabbed the cloth and began scrubbing again at the fat red lines marking her slender back.

She didn't leave her room for the next two days. 

X X X

It took a couple months before either Farlan or Levi felt even close to where they were before the pneumonia and the fall. They managed a couple robberies in the meantime anyway. One had Farlan sneaking into a tower house to pick a merchant's safe while Levi and Jan staged a loud argument outside as a distraction. With the cash from that they paid the rest of the rent, finally refilled their supplies of food, charcoal, soap, lamp oil, and black tea, and paid the loan to get back Levi's watch. Farlan decided to call the pistol a loss. Jan had heard rumors that the Military Police were cracking down on illegal weapons, and were watching the usual dealers.

A month later was a frantic smash and grab on a cart in transit, involving nearly the entire gang, that netted them a cash bag and half a shipment of gas and canisters. They only managed to pull that one off by the skin of their teeth. Farlan's tender ribs kept him on the ground game, and Levi was still easily winded using the ODM gear. Isabel was out of practice too, it seemed. She mistimed several swings, had to make panicked course corrections, and nearly crashed into a building once, and the ground twice. By the time they got away from pursuit she was pale and shaking, and chose to walk the rest of the way home via soggy alleys.

Isabel took her share of the money, and left for a few hours. When she came back to the apartment Farlan and Levi were sitting in the front room, drinking fresh tea and eating beet treacle on toast, celebrating. Somewhere out there, the rest of the gang was likely getting blindly drunk. The redhead grinned as she plopped Farlan's books on the table, but when she reached into her pocket and pulled out the keepsake pendant the look of relief on Farlan's face suddenly had tears trickling down Isabel's cheeks. 

She wiped them away hurriedly. "He still had the rings too." She said choking the wavering down in her voice, "You could go buy them back if you wanted. I was out of cash by that point." She put the necklace into his outstretched hands. 

Farlan ran his thumb over the front of the pendant, looking at the different colored curls of fine hair preserved safely under the glass. "Isabel," he smiled, "I was going to go get this tomorrow myself."

"Well." She beamed, with tears still leaking from her eyes, "I beat you to it!" Then she burst out sobbing, grabbed a slice of toast, and ran up the stairs.

"Has she always been such a weepy mess?" Levi was flipping through the books, looking for damage.

Farlan walked over to the shelf and took down his mother's red box. "You should have seen her when you were sick." He slipped the pendant in among the letters and pictures and closed the lid.

"I'm better now. So what's her excuse?" 

Running his finger over the shiny lid of his precious keepsake, Farlan frowned to himself. Each day it seemed Isabel presented him with a new piece to a puzzle. And he didn't know if it was his business fitting those pieces together and seeing clearly the picture his mind was sketching out. He kept hoping it was his apprehensive nature, or maybe guilt, causing him to make connections that weren't there. Levi had seemed oblivious to it all, giving him hope that he was just imagining. 

Levi took a long sip of tea, clearly savoring the fresh leaves they'd gotten. "Detle's trying the gear again this week." He said, "I'm going to take Isabel along. Idiot nearly got herself killed twice today, she needs the practice." 

"I'll come too."

Levi cocked an eyebrow, "You're healed up for that?"

Farlan shrugged, "Even if I'm not, I can still tell them what to do. You're not the most patient instructor."

"I'm always patient." Levi said, the teacup at his lips.

Farlan didn't bother to refute him.

X X X

The Underground was, in many ways like a sick plant, or a dying tree. While parts of it were alive and growing, it decayed the further it spread from the lifeline of the stairwells. And in the furthest places, far from stairs and party districts, brothels and clubs, markets and workshops, beyond the tenements and flophouses, the city was completely dead. 

There was no clear light here, but what you brought with you. The buildings rotten and claimed by no one but a horrifying ecosystem of rats, cats, dogs, and desperate squatters. The few human inhabitants destitute addicts, cripples, and runaways, people that had nothing left to sell that anyone was willing to buy, not even their own bodies. They picked through the trash at the very edge of life, miserably scraping together a few more meaningless days. 

Decades ago, children started calling these places 'The Grots'. Now that those kids were grown up, everyone used the term. 

At the far edge of The North Grots, where the tumbledown buildings petered out in lean-to shacks, Levi had staked out a bolt hole. The buildings here were made of stone, there were a fair number of squat roof columns close together, and beyond them inky darkness where the increasing slope of the ground rose up to meet the curving descent of the cavern's ceiling. It was a decent place to hide if the Military Police ever got too nosy, a good place to bury contraband they didn't want back at the apartment, but most of all, it was the perfect place to practice with the ODM Gear.

Still anxious that the ruckus caused by the cart job had earned them lingering attention, Farlan convinced the group to bag and carry their gear to The Grots, rather than wear it openly. Now, at the base of a column dead-ending a darkened street, Detle, Levi, and Isabel started belting on harnesses. Farlan helped Detle sort out the complexity of the narrower bands that snaked down his legs. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Isabel tightening the belts across her chest and wincing, only to loosen them again. It took her a while to get every bit of the harness just how she wanted it, and when she finished he noted that several of the prongs weren't latched through the most worn holes. More puzzle pieces. 

Nearly everyone in the gang tried vertical maneuvering at one point or another, but very few developed any real skill with it. Some had gotten the hang of using the gear to scale walls or climb pillars, but most just didn't have the control necessary to 'fly'. Pulling out the hooks from one anchor point and firing them into another, while hurtling through the air high above the rooftops, took a level of faith or foolhardiness and hard won muscle memory beyond the abilities of the men on their crew. 

Maybe that's why Isabel had learned it so fast. When they took her in she weighed less than a bag of onions, and was stupidly fearless. Every scare and near miss she had in her training slipped right out of her conscious mind, leaving only instincts. Levi had heard that up on the surface they enlisted kids in the military as young as twelve to train them in vertical maneuvering while they were still light children that didn't know how bad their bodies could break. 

When Sander had fallen out of the sky practicing, broke his back, and died after two weeks of agony, Farlan got a lot choosier about who they let try flying. Right now only Detle, who was small and quick with a stunted body that seemed permanently adolescent, showed any promise. 

Isabel and Detle, now completely geared up, fired off their cables and flew their way methodically down the abandoned street, reeling in and refiring at distances they knew by heart by now. Farlan and Levi sat on a crate by the pillar and watched them.

Levi scrutinized their form, but knew better than to shout anything at Detle while he was midair. The young man was already white and sweating, his teeth clenched and brow furrowed in terrified determination. At the end of the street they both landed, and then made their way back. Detle stumbled as he returned, gasping more from nerves and vertigo than exhaustion. The young thug looked up at Levi hopefully. 

"Sloppy." Levi said. "You had your legs dangling behind you like limp rags."

Detle's face fell. 

Levi got up from the crate and walked over. He tapped the boy in the stomach with the handgrip of his own gear. "And your back was arched like a damn cat in heat. Tighten that gut."

"Again. Both of you." Levi said. "And this time I want you to swing around the pillar at the end of the street, got it? I want you in the air the whole way."

Isabel wiped her mouth with her sleeve. Uncharacteristically silent. 

They took off again, down the street, and at the end they hooked on the pillar and both made a wide arc around it, like stones being thrown from a sling. As they came back down the street, Farlan noticed that Isabel's limbs were lose and trembling, her chin was tucked down by her chest. He stood up, alarmed.

"Levi." 

Isabel retracted her hooks, and shot them again. But it was misaimed and mistimed. They attached to nothing. Her arc of momentum began carrying her down.

"Levi!" 

Levi was already on the move, having fired his anchors at a building beyond her. Eight feet from the ground, his arm caught her around the waist and redirected her fall, pulling her in a wide swing. His other hand gripped the triggers of his gear and let up on the brake, reeling them back down. They hit the ground as lightly as he could manage. Detle landed after them, staring open mouthed at the pair.

Isabel was panting hard, and pushed away from Levi's chest. She staggered a few feet from him, gripping both sides of her head, before sinking to her knees in the dirt. Levi grimaced as she threw up.   
Farlan rushed to her, ignoring the stabbing pain in his side. He knelt beside her, and put his hand on her shoulder to steady her. She looked up at him, face white, smile shaky. "Whew," She said, wiping her mouth, "Don't know what happened, guess I got dizzy."

"Dizzy?" Farlan asked.

Isabel nodded, and listed slightly to the side, he gripped her arm tighter. "Yeah, it was the same when we did that job last week. All of a sudden I just got so dizzy. Like I was about to pass out. But it got better once I was on the ground."

"Think you're getting sick?" Levi asked.

She shrugged, and wouldn't look at him. "Don't know who I would have gotten it from."

"Yeah." Levi holstered his handgrips. "The way you've been lazing around like a slug in your room all spring. You've hardly seen anyone."

She laughed, but the laugh was nervous and weak. Farlan helped her to her unsteady feet, eyes roving over her. Then one of her knees buckled slightly, and she leaned forward. Farlan caught Isabel again, his arm across her chest, and she yelped at the contact. And the cry wasn't outrage or surprise, it was pain.

The last puzzle piece fell into place for Farlan. There was no other picture he could draw from what he'd seen and felt. As Isabel straightened up again, and gave him another trembling reassuring smile that only made him more certain, an aching knot of ice twisted itself in his chest. It was the pain of knowing, and being the only one who would admit it. 

"We're going home." Farlan said. "And then we need to talk."

X X X 

Isabel sat in a chair in the apartment, looking miserable. 

"Isabel. Is there something you need to tell us." Farlan coaxed.

"I don't know what you want from me? What's the big deal? I was sick."

"You really think that's all this is?"

"I fall once and--"

"Isabel." Farlan cut her off. She clamped her mouth shut and bowed her head. 

"What the hell is this even about?" Levi crossed his arms over his chest. "With how shitty things are down here, it's a wonder we're not all sick all the time."

Farlan ached as he looked at Isabel, staring at her hands gripping her own thighs. "Isabel." He said, gently. "Stop it." She took a ragged breath that caught in her throat. "You know, don't you. Maybe you haven't admitted it to yourself. But you know." The hands on her knees clenched into shaking fists.

"Know what?" Levi asked. Isabel shrank in on herself.

"She's pregnant." Farlan gripped the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes. 

So he didn't see the rock hard punch slam into his unsuspecting gut. 

He fell wheezing to the floor, choking back vomit. As he tried to stand, Levi hauled off and hit him again square in the mouth. Farlan tasted blood and saw stars. Then he was grabbed by the collar and hauled to his feet. Levi pulled Farlan's bruised face inches away from his own.

Levi's eyes were wide, blazing in indignation. "You pig." He spat at him between clenched teeth. "Of all the disgusting--"

"Bro!" Isabel said.

"She's a _child_."

"No!" Isabel shook her head. "No, Levi, I wasn't--"

"Shut up!" Levi kept a deathgrip on Farlan's shirt. "I don't care what this shit told you! You're too young!" His eyes narrowed as he clenched a fist underneath Farlan's split lip, dripping blood, "You filthy rat! Under my nose, you thought--"

"It wasn't him!"

"Then who?" Levi barked, glaring daggers at Farlan, obviously unconvinced. Farlan tried to pull away, but in a flash he found a knife at his throat. He could only stand mute before Levi's fury. 

"I don't know!"

"What does that mean?" Levi snapped. "What do you mean you don't--" His face slackened. His gaze unfocused as he remembered, then realized. 

Farlan's heart sank, and in desperation he tried to catch Isabel's attention. She could lie. He'd let her lie. Anything to keep Levi from this truth. 

"Isabel," Levi's voice sounded like it came from far away, "Where did you get the money for the medicine?"

Isabel caught Farlan's gaze for a second, saw him silently pleading. But she scrunched her eyes shut. "I already told you, I did a job."

Levi lowered the knife, and then his arms. Farlan fell to his knees, gasping, still trying to recover from the punches. Levi didn't react to it, instead he turned to the girl in the chair, his face unreadable, wreathed in shadow. "What kind of job?"

The silence between the three was long, hollow and aching as a wound. Finally Isabel whispered. "Entertainment." The knife slipped from Levi's enervated fingers, and clattered to the floor.

"No," Levi's shoulders sank. "Isabel, you didn't. Why?" 

Her head snapped up, eyes flashing "Why?!" She said, "Why?! Bro, are you serious?"

"You didn't have--"

"Really?" Her face was red with anger, "You were coughing yourself to death right in front of us. You expect that we were just going to sit here and watch? And then, and then Farlan nearly got himself killed trying to do a job without you! And everything we had worth anything was pawned! An' it still wasn't enough." A few tears forced themselves out as she ranted, "An' you were so sick. Worse every day. An' I knew I couldn't steal enough on my own. An we we're gonna lose everything, Bro. Everything." 

She furiously brushed the drops from her eyes. "So someone offered me a job, an' I took it. An' I'm glad I did. An'..an' I'm not ashamed. Cause it got us what we needed. Cause you're better now. "

Farlan struggled painfully to his feet and limped over to Isabel's chair. "Isabel." He said, hoarsely. "I couldn't save him. And you did." He put a hand on her shoulder. "Thank you."

Her head ducked back down, so her shaggy red hair blocked her face from their view. 

Levi stared at her, stunned, as the weight of what she'd done sank over him. Finally he closed his eyes and turned away from both of them, facing into a dark corner of the shabby room. His right hand came up and gripped his left forearm, covering a cluster of tiny red marks. Inadvertent tattoos, a side effect of the injections. 

"Farlan," He finally said. "We still got money from the cart job?"

"Yes."

"Go get it." 

Farlan took a step to the stairs. "What do we need it for?" He asked.

"Dr. Sauer. As if that crook hasn't made enough out of this yet." Levi said through clenched teeth. "Still, he'll have the right stuff."

"What?" Isabel asked.

"Medicine for this." His eyes darted back at the girl, "It'll make you sick for a while but..." he stopped. Isabel was shrinking further in her chair, face pale.

So quietly they could hardly make out the words."If that's what you guys think."

Farlan felt his stomach fall to his feet, watching the skinny girl hunched miserably in on herself. "Isabel," He said, mouth dry with fear. "What do you think?"

Isabel twisted at her trousers with her hands, wrestling with herself, then looked up at both men. Her red hair fell back, and they could see her huge, green eyes, brimming with unshed tears. She bit her lip, and finally shook her head.

Farlan glanced at Levi, but had to look away. The other man's face was absolutely haunted with guilt, staring at Isabel as if he was seeing a terrible ghost. His lips parted slightly and he took a single shaky breath. 

"Okay." Levi said.


End file.
